


Finding Santa Fe

by Skittery



Category: Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, M/M, One Shot, Slow Build, this is my first fic ever omg
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-12
Updated: 2014-07-12
Packaged: 2018-02-08 12:12:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,543
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1940595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skittery/pseuds/Skittery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was there in the pauses when they spoke to each other, and the hidden glances that increasingly felt like a promise, like a treasure that needed to be held close and kept safe.  It was there in the lingering smile when they went their separate ways for the day, and in the brief touches: the cautious grasping of hands and shoulders that had seamlessly turned from nothing into something.  </p>
<p>Get together fic. Schmoopy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Finding Santa Fe

**Author's Note:**

> My very first fic ever!
> 
> Thanks to my darling sibling for the beta.

It wasn’t the kind of thing that happened fast, with bells and whistles and fireworks and a brass band playing somewhere in the distance. It happened slowly, over time, settling over them like the early morning mist that caresses the pavement bordering grass with dew. It arrived quietly, and without commotion; not like a headline but like a tiny note tucked into the very back of the paper, smaller in print than the stories around it but, if you happened to read it, filled with meaning and import. 

It came softly, gradually, but once it was there, it was like an elephant in the room, impossible to ignore, screaming for attention and filling every minute with the anxious excitement of the thing you don’t quite have and yet could never bear to lose. It was there in the pauses when they spoke to each other, and the hidden glances that increasingly felt like a promise, like a treasure that needed to be held close and kept safe. It was there in the lingering smile when they went their separate ways for the day, and in the brief touches: the cautious grasping of hands and shoulders that had seamlessly turned from nothing into something. 

It was there in the mornings when they met before everyone else to just sit, or the scattered times when they had slept beside each other, not close enough to touch but just enough to hear the breathing of the other slow. It was there in a way that some of the other boys noticed, and others dismissed as wild imaginings or brotherly affection. 

But it was there, and perhaps Medda was the first to put it into words when she placed an arm around him like the mother he didn’t have, and said with a knowing wink, “Jack Kelly, you look like a boy who found him a reason to get up in the morning.”

***

Jack could remember the day they met, although it had been years before. He remembered it with a fondness now that overshadowed the other memories of his childhood, not that there were many good ones to latch onto. Jack’s childhood had not been kind. Alone, he had found his way up in New York City, and although the streets had made him hard, teaching him in days spent hungry and nights spent freezing, he had been determined from the start that he would never become a man like his father. Day after day he swallowed the pain and the anger and the hurt he felt until they turned into charisma and pride and joviality, and if his smiles and jokes were sometimes forced, who was the wiser? He had made himself the best damn newsie in Manhattan, and his hopeful followers far outweighed the others that had deserved a collision with his fists and gotten it.

If there had been a photographer there to document the scene, he would have seen Jack surrounded by the other newsies when it happened, waiting for the headline to proclaim what kind of a selling day it was going to be; he would have seen laughing and play-fighting and generally oblivious when the smaller boy with the pronounced limp walked up to the line in the square. Anyone else would have attested to the truth of this scene but in Jack’s memory he was alone when they first met. He was leaning against a building or a lamppost, maybe, alone with his thoughts and the dim morning light, when the limping boy walked up to him and smiled and changed everything.

The thing that Jack would always remember most clearly was the first time he saw other boy’s smile, and how it was so genuine and full of hope and vivacity, and so unlike his own peacock’s smile, that strutted across his handsome face. It made Jack want to smile with that same openness; in his memory, it had just been the two of them, in the empty square with the dawn peering down at them, smiling at each other for the first time.

Some of the other boys had laughed, how’d a cripple expect to make it selling papes walking around the city, but none of them had lasted and he had. Jack had taken him under his wing, and some days later, with a stolen crutch firmly under his arm and change jingling in his pocket; Crutchie had earned himself a nickname and place among Jack’s fellow newsies. 

Sometimes, one of the boys would recount that day, how Crutchie had limped into the square and proclaimed himself the unlikeliest of newsies and outsold all of them within a day, so perfect legs be damned! Crutchie would laugh along and his cheeks would flush just a tiny bit, and Jack would find himself looking at the smaller boy and thinking about that first smile. 

***

Crutchie knew from the start that he liked Jack. He liked most of the boys, and in those first months he bounced between different sleeping spots, trying to find his own corner in a city where he couldn’t afford a thing. But even after he had found some places that felt okay, that didn’t get you too close to the thieves or the cops, he never felt as at home anywhere as he did on the rooftop with Jack. 

Jack was the handsome, confident boy that Crutchie wished he could be; the others followed Jack with admiration coloring their faces, and Crutchie never could tell if the jealousy that sometimes sprung up in his throat was because of the way they looked at Jack or the way he looked back at them. 

Still, what most people saw was “Captain Jack,” the fierce and charismatic leader who looked out for everyone and fought so savagely for the people he knew and felt the need to protect. The other side of Jack was less visible, and that was the side that Crutchie waited for those evenings on the rooftop; the Jack who was less show and more raw, with smiles that were more genuine even if the edges were tinged with sadness, and who would stare into the distance and talk about places he had never been as though he couldn’t wait to get back to them. Jack would put one or both arms around Crutchie’s shoulders and tell him about the moon, about the water and land and all the open space, more space than they would know what to do with; no more tiny corners of New York, no sir, no more sleeping on hard cold streets or letting no one give him shit about some bum leg that don’t even matter anyway. 

Over the years, they had become like a bedtime story for Crutchie; when they were younger he would go to sleep with visions of Jack’s perfect place floating through his head, and as they grew older, the stories became less soothing than the feel of Jack’s arms around him, and so he let Jack wax on about a place they would never visit, because he didn’t want him to let go in the place where they actually were. 

***

There was a crescent moon glowing above them as Jack helped Crutchie up onto the roof where he had stashed his paltry pile of things for the night, the two of them huddling together against the autumn chill as they had done so many times on so many autumn nights in the years before this one. Crutchie shivered in spite of himself and Jack readily put an arm around the smaller boy, although both of them were aware of the slight hesitation that had suddenly appeared to surround their casual contact. 

It’s just that we’re gettin’ older, Crutchie thought as he settled back against Jack, it’s only natural people grow a little apart. But it wasn’t growing apart that sent a tiny tingle up his spine as they sat pressed together. 

Jack pressed his back against a the cold bricks of a chimney, and felt the silence closing in over them. It was so strange that after years of easy talking, he felt like he couldn’t find the words he wanted to say. He could feel the other boy’s discomfort as plain as his own, and he wondered idly about the nights that Crutchie didn’t spend up here with him, whether he was off with some girl or other, and the idea filled him with a surprising flood of spite and disappointment. He tightened his grip on Crutchie’s shoulder unintentionally, and received a questioning sideways glance in return. 

“You don’t need to hold so tight,” Crutchie said, grinning, “we ain’t so close to the edge this time.” Jack smiled back weakly, unable to quell the feeling that this time, even though they were firmly situated in the middle of the roof, they were very close to the edge of something.

Silence again. “Aren’t ya gonna tell me a story?” Crutchie asked finally.

Jack shrugged; he couldn’t shake the feeling of anticipation mixed with vertigo, and suddenly New Mexico seemed to escape his grasp. Partly out of curiosity and partly to deflect the attention off of himself, he turned the question around. “Why don’t ya tell me your own story? Where d’ya go to escape it all?” His voice held steady, thankfully, bravado filling in the spaces where he suddenly felt like a tiny child again.

Crutchie giggled, and even though Jack couldn’t see his face clearly, he could picture the smile rising to Crutchie’s face, and it made his own anxiety lessen. Whatever was happening, whatever was sitting in between them, could not take away the comfort that smile brought to Jack’s tumultuous life.

“W-well, it’s not muchofa story really, not like yours...” Crutchie sputtered and danced around the words, and Jack turned to him in surprise. Crutchie couldn’t turn it on like Jack could, but he was usually filled with his own brand of confidence. 

“C’mon,” Jack shook Crutchie’s shoulder slightly in encouragement, “tell me where you go when ya close yer eyes.”

Crutchie could feel the blood rising to his cheeks, and he was grateful that the silver sliver of moon was too dim to really illuminate their perch. His heart was pounding, and he knew that this was one of those moments where you had to make a choice, to take a step in one direction or the other, and face the repercussions of either path. This was one of those moments that you would remember your entire life, and when it crossed your mind, it would either fill you with joy or regret. He had to choose quickly, and when he did, it was like letting go of a breath he had been holding for years, like letting a huge weight fall from his back, and he could have sworn that all of the colors around them (never mind that they were mostly rust and brown and shadow) seemed to grow brighter and more vivid. 

He turned his face slightly towards Jack’s and said, more calmly than he would have thought possible, “I come up here, with you.” He paused, registering what was maybe shock and maybe anger and maybe something else, something more like happiness, in Jack’s eyes. “This up here’s my Santa Fe.”

And then, for Jack, too, it was like a dam breaking, and even though the moon was starting to disappear behind clouds, the whole roof seemed to shine, brighter than anything Jack had seen before in New York City. It was suddenly impossible for him to breathe and he felt more keenly how close the two of them were and the places where their bodies made contact and all of it made sense, all of the silences and the awkwardness and the hesitations and the glances that weren’t hidden well enough and the color rising in Crutchie’s cheeks as he looked at him. 

Without even really realizing he was doing it, Jack put the palm of his free hand against Crutchie’s warm cheek and as Crutchie leaned his cheek into Jack’s hand, his breath caught for a second and that was enough for Jack to know that they were both aware that something had changed, that they had stepped close enough to the edge that there was no turning back, and that neither of them was feeling any regret at this moment. 

Jack pushed forward so that their foreheads were touching, and they sat like that for what seemed like unending minutes, their breathing ragged and their cheeks flushed. For Jack, who was always so strong, and who never put himself before the needs of the boys around him, it was a moment of clear and unabashed calm and openness, and he knew with sudden and complete that no one but Crutchie had ever seen him like this before, and that he would be fine if Crutchie was the only person who ever did see him like this. 

After what might have been a minute, or a day, or years, Jack pulled his eyes away from Crutchie’s and looked down somewhat sheepishly, grinning. Crutchie continued to look at him, questioningly: sheepish was not an adjective usually associated with Jack Kelly.

“You know what Medda tol’ me?” Jack said finally, looking back up into Crutchie’s eyes. “She said, ‘Jack Kelly’,” he continued, putting on his best Medda impression, although he still felt breathless, “’you look like a boy who found him a reason to get up in the mornin’.’”

Crutchie felt his blush spreading higher, “She was talkin’ about me?”

Jack grinned and nodded, and Crutchie felt his heart pounding harder under the glow of that grin. “But ya know,” Jack continued, “I think she was wrong.”

Crutchie frowned. Jack’s expression got serious again, and it was filled with the intensity that usually accompanied Jack’s stories, or that came out when he was defending one of the smaller or younger boys. 

“I already got a reason to get up in the mornin’,” Jack continued, “cause of I don’t wanna starve. But you,” he paused briefly, as though considering the feel of the words on his tongue, “you’re my reason to come back at night.”

***

It wasn’t the kind of thing that happened fast, with drums and trumpets and fireworks marking its triumphant arrival. It happened slowly, and over time, creeping in like moonlight spreading across a room as the moon rises over the horizon, like water seeping into the ground after a drought, like the steady progression of a sapling into a great tree. But it was there, like an old friend, like a heartbeat, like music a nearby apartment slipping in through the open window on a breeze and filling the room with sounds you never knew it lacked until that moment. 

It was there in the smiles that weren’t for anyone else, in the glances that lasted a little too long, in the furtive grasping of hands after dark. It was there in words whispered for fear that they would catch on the wind and float away, and it was there in the morning light that hit them as they slept close enough to hear each other’s breathing. 

Even if none of the other boys knew or acknowledged it, it was there.


End file.
